Stone Moves From Battlefield Heroes to Rock ‘Warrior’

Some might find it strange that filmmaker and Vietnam veteran Oliver Stone is preparing a movie on Jim Morrison, the lead singer of the rock group the Doors who embraced war protesters and draft dodgers.

But Stone, whose wartime duty inspired the Academy Award-winning motion picture “Platoon,” said Morrison was a soldier on a different front.

“In his own way, he was very much on the front line. He was a warrior,” Stone said. “He was an outlaw rebel pushing at boundaries. A searcher who wrote about sex and death, two things any guy who’d been in Vietnam could relate to.”

To be released in March, the as-yet-untitled movie presents a mine field of obstacles for Stone: Morrison’s drug- and alcohol-induced exploits, his mysterious death of a heart attack at age 27 in 1971, and contract stipulations from the Morrison estate limiting the screenplay’s ability to explore Morrison’s family life.

Then, with a few exceptions, there’s the less-than-shining track record of rock ‘n’ roll movies--witness last summer’s “Great Balls of Fire,” based on the career of Jerry Lee Lewis.

Stone said he is well aware of the challenges.

“You do not get out of these things alive--or whole. At the end of the day you risk being condemned. Ideally, I would rather not be involved in this movie.”

So why is he doing it?

“The fact is, I can’t help myself. I’ve become obsessed with Morrison.”